Residents angry, in disbelief at notion of closing school

MiddletownPress.com: "Friday, May 23, 2008
Posted on Tue, May 20, 2008 Zoom + | Zoom -
By CRISTINA D. JOHNSON

MIDDLETOWN — MacDonough school isn’t going anywhere.

Parents, faculty members, staff and city officials squeezed into doorways and library aisles, some sitting in the media room adjoining the library and spilling out into hallways at Middletown High School last night to express everything from support and encouragement to the board of education on the “tough job they have” to anger and disbelief over the notion of closing MacDonough Elementary School.

Amy Natale was among those who stood in the back of the room, stuffed into the doorway, straining to hear what was being said regarding the school her 9-year-old son, Thomas, attends.

“I don’t think it’s right,” she said. “Thomas has gotten a good education and he’s happy at that school.”
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Natale said her mother and father both attended MacDonough and said — as her son sat in the audience with his beloved kindergarten teacher — “About 230 kids would be very upset.”

Although the suggestion of closing the 80-year-old North End sch"